2 Timothy 1:7

1:7 For God did not give us a Spirit ¹  of fear but of power and love and self-control.

Joshua 1:7

1:7 Make sure you are ²  very strong and brave! Carefully obey ³  all the law my servant Moses charged you to keep! ⁴  Do not swerve from it to the right or to the left, so that you may be successful ⁵  in all you do. ⁶ 

Haggai 2:4

2:4 Even so, take heart, Zerubbabel,’ says the Lord. ‘Take heart, Joshua son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and ⁷  all you citizens of the land,’ ⁸  says the Lord, ‘and begin to work. For I am with you,’ says the Lord who rules over all.

Haggai 2:1

The Glory to Come

2:1 On the twenty-first day of the seventh month, ⁹  the Lord spoke again through the prophet Haggai: ¹⁰ 

Colossians 1:13

1:13 He delivered us from the power of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of the Son he loves, ¹¹ 

Colossians 1:2

1:2 to the saints, the faithful ¹²  brothers and sisters ¹³  in Christ, at Colossae. Grace and peace to you ¹⁴  from God our Father! ¹⁵ 

Colossians 1:9-10

Paul’s Prayer for the Growth of the Church

1:9 For this reason we also, from the day we heard about you, ¹⁶  have not ceased praying for you and asking God ¹⁷  to fill ¹⁸  you with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, 1:10 so that you may live ¹⁹  worthily of the Lord and please him in all respects ²⁰  – bearing fruit in every good deed, growing in the knowledge of God,

Ephesians 6:10

Exhortations for Spiritual Warfare

6:10 Finally, be strengthened in the Lord and in the strength of his power.

Philippians 4:13

4:13 I am able to do all things ²¹  through the one ²²  who strengthens me.

Philippians 4:2

4:2 I appeal to Euodia and to Syntyche to agree in the Lord.

Philippians 3:18

3:18 For many live, about whom I have often told you, and now, with tears, I tell you that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.

[1:7]  ¹ tn Or “a spirit,” denoting the human personality under the Spirit’s influence as in 1 Cor 4:21; Gal 6:1; 1 Pet 3:4. But the reference to the Holy Spirit at the end of this section (1:14) makes it likely that it begins this way also, so that the Holy Spirit is the referent.

[1:7]  ² tn Or “Only be.”

[1:7]  ³ tn Heb “so you can be careful to do.” The use of the infinitive לִשְׁמֹר (lishmor, “to keep”) after the imperatives suggests that strength and bravery will be necessary for obedience. Another option is to take the form לִשְׁמֹר as a vocative lamed (ל) with imperative (see Isa 38:20 for an example of this construction), which could be translated, “Indeed, be careful!”

[1:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “commanded you.”

[1:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “be wise,” but the word can mean “be successful” by metonymy.

[1:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “in all which you go.”

[2:4]  ⁷ tn Heb “and take heart.” Although emphatic, the repetition of the verb is redundant in contemporary English style and has been left untranslated.

[2:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “the people of the land” (עַם הָאָרֶץ, ’am ha’arets); this is a technical term referring to free citizens as opposed to slaves.

[2:1]  ⁹ tn Heb “In the seventh [month], on the twenty-first day of the month.”

[2:1]  ¹⁰ tc Heb “the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet, saying.” The MT has בְּיַד (bÿyad, “by the hand of” = “through” [so NAB, NIV, NLT] as in 1:1, 3); the Murabba’at Dead Sea text reads אֶל (’el, “to”), perhaps because the following command is given to the prophet.

[1:13]  ¹¹ tn Here αὐτοῦ (autou) has been translated as a subjective genitive (“he loves”).

[1:2]  ¹² tn Grk “and faithful.” The construction in Greek (as well as Paul’s style) suggests that the saints are identical to the faithful; hence, the καί (kai) is best left untranslated (cf. Eph 1:1). See ExSyn 281-82.

[1:2]  ¹³ tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited).

[1:2]  ¹⁴ tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”

[1:2]  ¹⁵ tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א A C F G I [P] 075 Ï it bo), read “and the Lord Jesus Christ” at the end of this verse, no doubt to conform the wording to the typical Pauline salutation. However, excellent and early witnesses (B D K L Ψ 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 al sa) lack this phrase. Since the omission is inexplicable as arising from the longer reading (otherwise, these mss would surely have deleted the phrase in the rest of the corpus Paulinum), it is surely authentic.

[1:9]  ¹⁶ tn Or “heard about it”; Grk “heard.” There is no direct object stated in the Greek (direct objects were frequently omitted in Greek when clear from the context). A direct object is expected by an English reader, however, so most translations supply one. Here, however, it is not entirely clear what the author “heard”: a number of translations supply “it” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV; NAB “this”), but this could refer back either to (1) “your love in the Spirit” at the end of v. 8, or (2) “your faith in Christ Jesus and the love that you have for all the saints” (v. 4). In light of this uncertainty, other translations supply “about you” (TEV, NIV, CEV, NLT). This is preferred by the present translation since, while it does not resolve the ambiguity entirely, it does make it less easy for the English reader to limit the reference only to “your love in the Spirit” at the end of v. 8.

[1:9]  ¹⁷ tn The term “God” does not appear in the Greek text, but the following reference to “the knowledge of his will” makes it clear that “God” is in view as the object of the “praying and asking,” and should therefore be included in the English translation for clarity.

[1:9]  ¹⁸ tn The ἵνα (Jina) clause has been translated as substantival, indicating the content of the prayer and asking. The idea of purpose may also be present in this clause.

[1:10]  ¹⁹ tn The infinitive περιπατῆσαι (peripathsai, “to walk, to live, to live one’s life”) is best taken as an infinitive of purpose related to “praying” (προσευχόμενοι, proseucomenoi) and “asking” (αἰτούμενοι, aitoumenoi) in v. 9 and is thus translated as “that you may live.”

[1:10]  ²⁰ tn BDAG 129 s.v. ἀρεσκεία states that ἀρεσκείαν (areskeian) refers to a “desire to please εἰς πᾶσαν ἀ. to please (the Lord) in all respects Col 1:10.”

[4:13]  ²¹ tn The Greek word translated “all things” is in emphatic position at the beginning of the Greek sentence.

[4:13]  ²² tc Although some excellent witnesses lack explicit reference to the one strengthening Paul (so א* A B D* I 33 1739 lat co Cl), the majority of witnesses (א² D² [F G] Ψ 075 1881 Ï sy) add Χριστῷ (Cristw) here (thus, “through Christ who strengthens me”). But this kind of reading is patently secondary, and is a predictable variant. Further, the shorter reading is much harder, for it leaves the agent unspecified.